Recruitment often refers to the process of screening and selecting qualified people for a job at an organization or firm. The recruitment industry is typically classified by four types of agencies: employment agencies, recruitment websites and job search engines, “headhunters” for executive and professional recruitment, and in-house recruitment. Stages in recruitment include sourcing candidates by advertising or other methods, screening and selecting potential candidates using tests or interviews, making offers of employment to successful candidates, and hiring candidates who accept offers of employment. In order to meet recruiting objectives, mid-size and large-size organizations often retain professional recruiters or outsource some of the process to recruitment agencies to attract and select employees from outside the organization.
Recruiters aim to channel candidates into the hiring organizations application process. As a general rule, the agencies are paid by the companies and not the candidates. A recruitment agency historically has a physical location. A candidate may visit a local branch for a short interview and an assessment before further consideration. Recruitment consultants then work to match their pool of candidates to their clients' open positions. Suitable candidates are then short-listed and put forward for an interview with potential employers on a temporary (“temp”) or permanent (“perm”) basis.
However, a recruitment agency is not limited to a physical location. For example, recruiting may encompass Internet recruitment websites. Such sites typically have two main features: job boards and a resume/curriculum vitae (CV) database. Job boards allow member companies to post job vacancies. Websites typically capture candidate details and then pool them in client-accessed candidate management interfaces (also online).
The recruiting process includes job analysis, sourcing, screening and selection, and onboarding. The recruitment process typically starts with job analysis by documenting the actual or intended requirement of the job to be performed. Sourcing involves 1) advertising, a common part of the recruiting process, often encompassing multiple media, such as the Internet, general newspapers, job ad newspapers, professional publications, window advertisements, job centers, and campus graduate recruitment programs; and 2) recruiting research, which is the proactive identification of relevant talent who may not respond to job postings and other recruitment advertising methods. Screening and selection determines which candidates are qualified for the job by assessing the candidates' skills. Suitability for a job is typically assessed by looking for skills, e.g., communication, typing, and computer skills. Qualifications may be shown through résumés, job applications, interviews, educational or professional experience, the testimony of references, or in-house testing. Onboarding pertains to the introduction process for a new employee and is included in the recruitment process for retention purposes. A well-planned introduction often helps new employees become fully operational quickly and is often integrated with a new company and environment.
The recruitment is traditionally managed through results-based reporting based on the time necessary to fill a requisition (typically between 45 and 60 days). Consequently, a lagging indicator may result in identifying a problem late in the recruiting process so that corrective measures cannot be initiated in an expeditious manner. As can be appreciated, being able to recruit qualified employees within a desired period time is an important objective for the recruiting process.